SEC questioned Facebook about Instagram, mobile devices before IPO

Sat, 06/16/2012 - 03:00 EDT - LA Times

As Facebook Inc.'s much-anticipated public stock offering approached, federal regulators wanted to know more about the revenue it gets from mobile devices, its $1-billion deal to buy Instagram and the control that Chief Executive Mark Zuckerberg has over the company.

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As Facebook's much-anticipated public stock offering approached, federal regulators wanted to know more about the revenue it gets from mobile devices, its $1 billion deal to buy Instagram and the control CEO Mark Zuckerberg has over the company

Marissa Mayer is buying companies like it’s 1999.
The Yahoo! Inc. chief executive officer yesterday announced the company will acquire blogging network Tumblr Inc., part of a plan to restore the Web portal to its heyday as an Internet darling. With US$13-million in sales last year, Tumblr’s US$1.1-billion price tag represents the richest valuation for a dot-com company since 2000, according to data compiled by Bloomberg on deals for which revenue figures are available.

Facebook Inc on Thursday posted earnings growth that beat Wall Street's high expectations as the world's biggest online social network said daily mobile users exceeded the one billion mark for the first time. Its shares were down 1.7 percent, in after-hours trading, at $124.97. Mobile ads accounted for 84 percent of Facebook's total advertising revenue of $6.82 billion in the third quarter that ended Sept. 30, compared with 78 percent a year earlier. The company is also reaping the benefits of a big push into video, both on Facebook itself and on the Instagram photo app.

In the desktop and laptop era of computing, Google dominated the Internet -- and the ad spending on it. While it's largely responsible for the proliferation of mobile devices by licensing the Android OS, Google doesn't dominate the mobile Internet like it does the desktop Internet.

Facebook announced today it will buy messaging app WhatsApp for $19 billion in cash and stock. Facebook says it's buying WhatsApp because the startup has over 450 million active users and still growing. Both companies say they have similar missions, which is to connect as many people as possible. Here's Facebook's announcement explaining why it made the deal:

Lately, Facebook has been making a lot of defensive moves. The social network which once wowed us with product launches like Timeline and News Feed now seems to be scared of fast-growing startups, and it's losing focus.